MASS. MARKET: Weatherization activists have Quincy feeling the HEET

Jon Chesto

Saturday

Oct 30, 2010 at 12:01 AMOct 30, 2010 at 3:28 AM

When Patti Keville returned home after helping volunteers winterize a small apartment building in Cambridge last December, she immediately began to think about how to use what she learned from the experience.

Within a week, Keville went to the Home Depot store on Centre Street in Quincy and bought enough insulation to block the silent drafts that blew through the electrical outlets at her home in Quincy’s Houghs Neck section.

Keville wasn’t going to stop there. The next step for her: Finding a way to spread energy-efficient habits to homeowners across her home city. In the subsequent months, Keville has helped lead volunteers in Quincy to weatherize five homes and one neighborhood center. She’s still looking for volunteers for the next residential project, on Nov. 7.

This weatherization thing can be surprisingly addictive. It started as a good-hearted gesture of environmental activism in Cambridge two years ago. But it didn’t take long for the gospel of compact fluorescent light bulbs to spread: Activists in more than 20 other communities – ranging from small towns like Harvard to big cities such as Albany, N.Y. – are looking to emulate the concept espoused by the Cambridge Home Energy Efficiency Team. Since its inception in 2008, Cambridge HEET and its spin-offs have made nearly 150 buildings more energy-efficient.

The projects are affectionately known as “barn raisings,” a reference to a simpler time when neighbors eagerly joined together to help one of their own who was in need.

HEET co-founder Audrey Schulman says the group’s origins can be traced, to some extent, to the basement of her Cambridge house. About 10 years ago, the novelist wanted to finish the basement so her two young sons could have a place to play. She was reluctant to spend the money necessary to hire a contractor, so she slowly renovated the cellar, section by section, over the course of three years.

The completed basement provided a happy side benefit she didn’t quite expect: a 10 percent reduction in her family’s monthly heating bills. By filling in many of the gaps in the basement, she ended up blocking much of the cold air from intruding into the house.

Figuring out just how energy-efficient she could make her home soon became a bit of a game for Schulman. Among other things, she added insulation to the attic and walls, installed low-flow showerheads, and sealed pipe stacks and chimneys. Her heating bills plunged by another 40 percent over the course of five years, and her electric costs dropped by a similar amount.

When a group of like-minded environmentalists in her neighborhood met in the summer of 2008 to figure out their next project, Schulman pushed for applying her experiences at her own house to other buildings in Cambridge.

Schulman says she knew she was onto something when roughly 40 volunteers – many of them carrying their own tools – showed up for the first barn raising, in the midst of monsoon-like downpours.

The Cambridge group eventually shifted its focus from homes to buildings owned by nonprofits. Working with nonprofit groups allowed HEET to involve more people and achieve more energy savings with each converted building. On Wednesday, the Western Avenue Baptist Church in Cambridgeport received the HEET treatment, with help from volunteers at nearby Metabolix.

Schulman has stayed with HEET since the start, partly because she likes solving the mystery behind what makes each house or church tick. More importantly, Schulman says her involvement in HEET has changed her entire outlook. She says she used to get an knot in her stomach every time she spotted an SUV. But she says she has been pleasantly surprised by the wide range of individuals – ministers, contractors, college students, retirees – who show up to volunteer at each barn raising.

Then there are the volunteers who take the concept to other communities and put it to work. Jeremy Marin of Arlington says he stumbled into the Cambridge group’s activities about a year ago. He liked the idea so much, he quickly helped launch a similar group in his hometown. Marin says it has proven to be a fun, productive way to meet new neighbors. So far, five houses in Arlington have been weatherized. The homeowners pay for the supplies, which don’t typically total more than $500. The labor, of course, is free.

The lucky beneficiaries from Quincy HEET’s projects don’t even need to pay for the materials. That’s because Patti Keville has already sweet-talked the folks at the Home Depot to donate the supplies for free. She figures a homeowner’s savings on the utility bills will exceed the original cost of the materials within a year or two.

So what draws people to meet at a stranger’s house for several hours of light construction work?

Some show up to learn practical, hands-on lessons that they can take back and put to use in their own homes. Some like the fact that it’s a simple way to donate time to a neighbor who might be less fortunate. For others, it’s a social event, a chance to meet up over a shared cause.

All of them, however, have at least one motivating factor in common: These projects provide them with a tangible way to do their part to tackle the seemingly insurmountable problem of climate change caused by global pollution.

They know they’re helping out the planet, one drafty electrical outlet at a time.

Jon Chesto is the business editor of The Patriot Ledger. He may be reached at jchesto@ledger.com.

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